Bolivia's Entel confirms pay-TV plans, launches 4G LTE

Bolivia's Entel confirms pay-TV plans, launches 4G LTE

Juan Fernandez Gonzalez | 15-02-2014

Bolivian telco Entel has confirmed its expansion plans and announced that the deployment of 4G LTE will be completed by April. The company is also ready to launch a complete pay-TV service direct-to-home (DTH) via Túpac Katari national satellite.

Speaking to national news agency ANF, Entel's CEO Óscar Coca confirmed the plans to launch the pay-TV service, and said the company's goal was to offer the platform with a maximum price of $20 for the most expensive packages, which will mean strong competition for other pay-TV operators in the country.

“We are considering offering two packages, one with around 60 channels and other with more than 100,” said Coca.

The plans are now more ambitious than when first announced. Last year, Entel was said to be preparing a DTH platform with around 30 channels, using Túpac Katari, but now seems to be aiming to seriously compete in the pay-TV market. In November, following Tigo Millicom's purchase of Multivisión for $20 million, it announced it would spend another $10 million to modernise the system, intending to offer HD, DVR, pay-per-view and TV everywhere.

Bolivia's national satellite was launched in December 2013 and aims to be fully operational by next month. As well as Bolivian companies, groups from Ecuador, Peru and Paraguay intend to use the satellite's capacity.

In addition to the pay-TV plans, Entel announced the deployment of the mobile LTE network, which will be commercially operative from April.